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Are fall in value claims due to delay and deviation “Cargo Claims” ?
This issue arose in London Arbitration 4/19 under a charter on NYPE form which incorporated the Inter-Club Agreement 1984 with any subsequent modification or replacement. The parties agreed to extend time for six months under an addendum which contained cl.6 providing that charterers would be fully liable for all cargo claims, howsoever caused, including seaworthiness. During the extended charter period the vessel diverted to Goa and spent 36 days there. Charterers then deducted $295,000 from hire being what they had paid receivers in respect of financial losses due to a fall in the sound arrived value of the cargo due to the deviation to and delay at Goa. Although “cargo claims” could as a matter of language be restricted to claims for physical loss or damage, clause 6 had to be interpreted in the light of the Inter-Club Agreement which was also part of the charter and in particular the definition of “cargo claims” contained in the 1996 Agreement as “claims for loss, damage, shortage…overcarriage of or delay to cargo.” Charterer’s claim therefore related to a “cargo claim” for which they were fully liable under the terms of cl.6.
Professor Simon Baughen was appointed as Professor of Shipping Law in September 2013 (previously Reader at the University of Bristol Law School). Simon Baughen studied law at Oxford and practised in maritime law for several years before joining academia. His research interests lie mainly in the field of shipping law, but also include the law of trusts and the environmental law implications of the activities of multinational corporations in the developing world. Simon's book on Shipping Law, has run to seven editions (soon to be eight) and is already well-known to academics and students alike as by far the most learned and approachable work on the subject. Furthermore, he is now the author of the very well-established practitioner's work Summerskill on Laytime. He has an extensive list of publications to his name, including International Trade and the Protection of the Environment, and Human Rights and Corporate Wrongs - Closing the Governance Gap. He has also written and taught extensively on commercial law, trusts and environmental law. Simon is a member of the Institute of International Shipping and Trade Law, a University Research Centre within the School of Law, and he currently teaches at Swansea on the LLM in:Carriage of Goods by Sea, Land and Air; Charterparties Law and Practice; International Corporate Governance.
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